Untitled

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XVI, Issue 234, 1 October 1881, Page 2

Frozen fish by the last Orient steamer, sold privately in Melbourne, fetched—salmon, 3s 3d ; and cod, Is per Ib. An American paper says : William Sprague, of Rhode Island, has spent a fortune of 12,000,000 dollars left him by his father during the last twenty years. As he didn't start a daily paper to fill a lons?-felt want g it is difficult to understand how he expended so much money in that period. An Atlantic despatch flays :— " Prince Biimarck has lately received bo many threatening letters that a sense of his pertoaal danger has at last impressed him, and ha ii iu cootequence now laboring undtr great menu! excitement — so much ao as to aerioualy impair his health." A Newly-acquired Habit.— "Look heab, Uncle Mose, you fooled me wid dat ar.hoes I buyed from yor last w«ek. He jest drapt dead in bis tracki." "He nebber drapt dead in hit tracki, or anywhar else as long as I had kim, goin' on twenty yean. A Maori did a smart thing at Musiarton the other day, Hia horse was impounded, and faea and damages [amounted to £2 7s 6d. No owner claiming the beast, it was put up to auction in du« course, whan the Maori proprietor bought the horse for 6s 3d, thus savfDg £2 Is. The Archbishop of Canterbary is quoted as giving an unusual piece of advice to an assemblage of students tbe other day. He is reported to have observed that it was sometimes well to offer examiners what they don't ask when you are unable to give what they do, and he mentionad a case in point. A young man at Oxford bad a paper sent him by Mr Eebble containing six questions to which be replied : " I cannot answer any of these questions, but here are six that I can answer," and he answered his own questions so well that he passed. Tha New York World of 26th July says:— " o 'Donovan Rossa said yesterday that he knew nothing about the story cabled from London that the Liverpool Customs officers bad found dynamite machines concealed in barrels of cement, which also contained billheads bearing Kossa's name, and which were landed from steamers arriving from American ports. He declared that he had sent no explosives or machines to England, and did not know of anybody who had. As to the billheads, ho said if any were found they might have been put there by accident. •It ia not likely,' he said, • that I would put sucn billheads on barrels containing things I wanted to conceal, for the Bight of my name would lead the Customs officers to make a close examination.' "

A Japanese prince, who bears the enphoBions nataet- of Hizas-hi-Fushimi-no-Mya, has arrived in Paris, and surgeons are expecting^ a good business in mending disiocated jaws, ■which hare already become seriously impaired by pronouncing such names as Phya Bhaskarawonzse of Siam,and Aloys Karolyi de Nagi-Karoly of Hungary. Mr John W. Tobias, of the whaiiDg bifg ! Bosa Baker, which arrived at Boston on July Ist, reports that—' 1 One June |I7tb, at noon, iu latitude 27deg, 50min., longitude 67deg, 30min., we observed a large balloon to the westward. It was apparently about one mile in elevation and about five miles distant, and proceeding slcwly in a northwesterly course. We set our colours, but could get no signal from it. The aerial traveller remained in sight till 3 p.m.; when the weather became cloudy, and it was hidden from onr view. By the aid of our glasses we could distinctly see the car that was attached to it swaying to and fro as it moved along, but could not observe any occupant?. The balloon seemed to be of a whit9 or cream color, and of large size. It was proceeding in the direction of Cape Hatteras, the nearest point of the American coast, distant upwards of 600 miles." A Problem. — How does the increased population of Great Britain subsist ? Says a Home paper :— Mr Chamberlain reminded the guests at the Trinity House on Wednesday that even in a decade of years the population of the United Kingdom (of Great Britain only, by the way, not of Ireland) had increased by nearly three and a half millions — more than the total population of our prosperous Australasian colonies, and that increase was coincident with the fact that during the same period we have been able to send half a million to the colonies to found communities all over the world, aud at the same time we have sent out something like a million of inhabitants to add to the prosperity to the United States. Well, what have these three and a half millions of new comers been doing to get a living ? There has been no industrial expansion in any branch, manufacturing or agricultural. On the contrary, as we know, there has been a marked depression. Nearly every trade in the country professes to have been doing badly, and there has never been so small an increase in the amount of capital applied to domestic production. How then has this large new percentage of population found employment ? "We wonder how the President of the Board of Trade would answer this economic riddle ? A novel musical instrument, composed of stones, has lately been introduced to the public by Mr Daniel Till and Sons, They have been engaged eleven year3 in collecting and tuning the stone3 , which vary from G inches to 4 feet in length, and are placed on bands of straw. The tone produced is said to be very sweet. It is very well known (say the European Mail) that an expert is able to distinguish the wool that comes from the different countries, and classify it, without reference to brands. The merino wool, for instance, of South Africa and New Zealand differs in softness of texture to some superior Australian sorts, while the wool comicg under the same category in the Argentine Republic and at San Francisco differs again from either of the foregoing. Hitherto practical knowledge has enabled the expert to classify in such matters, but now it seems in eases of doubt taht science will come to his aid, for it is stated that a .French entomologist has found out that the wool of different countries can he distinguished by the insects which are found in the bales. The new English stamp available for ÜBe for postage or receipt differs in a notable respect from the ordinary penny stamp. It has not the letters in the four corners so long familiar in the older stamps. These were introduced with the object of preventing fraud on the part of persons disposed to take the trouble to make up a new stamp by cutting off the clean parts of old ones. la eucb case detection was csrtain on reference to the letters. In ptactice, however, it has been found that this device ia scarcely worth the trouble entailed, and the new stamp does not bear it. At the Union Bank of Australia meeting in London on August 2nd, the chairman (MiEdward Peach W. Miles) spoke as follows .- — " Some think that Queensland is the gem of our Australasian colonies, bot, personally speaking, I have a strong feeling in favour of New Zealand It i3 about eighteen months ago that I paid a flying visit to Victoria and New South Wales, but I spent the most of my time in New Zealand. I was gratified by all I saw. I happened to arrive in the middle of a bountiful harvest, and finer or more luxuriant crops I never saw. The whole colony looked like a land of plenty. I mention this because there has prevailed, and still exists, among a great many persons in England an idea that New Zealand has been going too fast and spending too much money, borrowing right and left. If you had been with me across and up and down the islands, and had seen, as I did, what a beautiful country it is, and simply requiring money to develop its latent resources, you would possibly agree with me. Whereever one looked it was said— "Do this and do that," The money I have alluded to has been spent in making roads, railways, and in building bridges and harbor3, and there is still room for many more such improvements. It is stated by an influential journal that in New South Wales there has been a steady decline in the imports from the United States. This tendency is the same in all the colonies, and is doubtless explained by the inflation of prices by protection — an inflation which, by depriving America of the power to compete, is driving her manufactures off the foreign markets, just as it has annihilated her mercantile marine. Germany has one million surplus women. The Government is circulating a large number of copies of the Maori Gazette amongst the natives of the present time, warning them against the small-pox, and ■urging them to get themselves and their children vaccinated without delay as there is no knowing when the disease may cross over from Australia. It also gives a graphic account of the ravages of this terrible malady amongst the North American Indians in 1837, instancing amongst other tribes the Assinboines which numbered 9000 before the advent of the small-pox, and were nearly exterminated by its ravages, also the Blackfeet Indians who left 4000 tents standing, all the inmates having perished. Sixty thousand people were said to have been swept olf in that year. The Auckland Star publishes the following somewhat carious communication from a □umber of influential chiefs, proposing to throw open about a million acres of land between Mokau and Taupo, much of which is believed to be auriferous:— 'Tongaporutu, sfch September, 1881. To Mr Macandrew and Mr M'Donald. " Friends, — Greeting to you who are there to carry out the duties of the Parliament, and to legislate in a manner necessary for our general welfare, that ocr improvements may advance in the eye of the Lord, in tbe government of the world, and of this colony. Sufficient on that point. This ia a word to you. Make haste and contract a marriage with our women, that there may be born unto us a male child. The woman we refer to is the land, and the child the Pontoma territory. The courting days are over, and something definite should be arrived at. We have deputed Mr Isaac Downs to explain the circumstances connected with the land we now offer to you. He has received from U3 full authority to act in the matter, and will recommend that which we are desirous to have done. Be Bpeedy and open up this laud while we are strong to give it to you. This is our final word. Lsc the first thing be to send Europeans on tbe land, the money will follow. Ii is now wanted, but summer is near at hand. The fish of the winter season will not take the bait which is for the fish of the summer season, eo do you be quick while there is a calm. This ia a good fish, and our giving up of tbia land will considerably advance the country. Delaya are dangerous. Thia is another word. Send U3 some monay tbat we may be able to go before you to discuss the matter, and place it oa a more satisfactory footing. Waste no time." " Ho is opposed to me, and very disagreeable," said a, debtor the other day at tbs Resident Mcgistrate'i Court. " You should have made him your liieud by not getting i D to his debt," was the cutting reply. " Creditors become very disagreeable when debtors make no honest effort to square up." 3?iYB handred and fifty thousand caseß of salmon will be packed; at Oregon this Mason.

Sevenpence per lb. for the frozen 'mutton taken home by the Protos, This means a margin of 3jd per lb in favcr of the producer. Thus a 601b sheep, which sells now in Sydney for 12b 63, fetches in England, after paying all expenses, 17a 6cl, and then there remain tbe skin and fat, worth some 4s, wfaicb brings tip the prices in round numbers ito a guinea. Shares in the meat companies should go up.— Bulletin The London Times of August 27 says.-— With each day there is less hope of a good harvest. The weather has turned against U3 at the critical moment. The loss to the country from the late rains is to be reckoned by millions of pounds. It is impossible to gather ,'graiu, and it will soon cease to be worth gathering. The situation of our farmers is dismal, and for maDy of them a bad harvest must mean absolute ruin. The racehorse "Waxy has been sold to Mr F. Wentworth, of Sydney, for £2,200. The new owner has already backed him to a large extent to win the Melbourne Cup. The golden sovereign makes leea noise in the contribution-box than a penny-piece — principally for the reason that it is never pat in. Miss B. O'Brien, for nine years housemaid at Stutt's Hotel, Melbourne, has married a Mr Shannon, worth £25,000.